


Let me hold you

by friendscookiesandcr



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Anxiety Attacks, F/F, Pre-Relationship, Yasha has an anxiety attack and Beau is there to comfort her
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-13
Updated: 2021-01-13
Packaged: 2021-03-18 06:55:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,736
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28739103
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/friendscookiesandcr/pseuds/friendscookiesandcr
Summary: “I don’t know why it happened today, nothing was wrong. But sometimes this sort of helpless feeling rushes through me. I am sorry, I wish you would have not have to witness this.” After a short consideration Yasha hesitantly continued: “but I am glad you were here to hold me.”
Relationships: Beauregard Lionett/Yasha
Comments: 2
Kudos: 79





	Let me hold you

**Author's Note:**

> This was supposed to be something very different just for myself but it turned into well this. It's quite personal so if you have comments I really hope you keep them positive :)
> 
> Also I do write about anxiety attack and how it might feel so don't read it if that is something you don't want to be confronted with!

Yasha looked at the same formula one too many times but its content was still a mystery to her. Considering the distraction, however, who could possibly blame her really. Beau was currently in the middle of explaining the last exercise to Jester and she looked extra cute while doing so. She was frantically pointing to different notebooks spread out on the table between them. Her oversize blue sweater that perfectly matched Beau’s eyes was showing off her shoulder and her hair was kind of a mess from brushing through it one too many times. Yasha felt a warmth spread through her body, immediately followed by an empty feeling. 

Beau wasn’t interested. Yasha had always suspected as much but thanks to Molly, her best friend and only person who knew more about her feelings than she did herself, she now had confirmation about this unlucky circumstance. Beau had been seeing someone over the summer. Worse than that, it had been one of the nicest people on campus. According to Molly the thing with Reani had only been a summer fling and was nothing too serious but Yasha knew better than to get her hopes up again. Beau wasn’t interested, not anymore. Yasha had left her waiting too long and nothing of their original flirtatious banter had survived that. They were still friends though, friends… 

Beau had temporarily finished her explanation of whatever formula Jester was struggling with and suddenly looked up from her notebooks. Their eyes met. Yasha could feel a blush creep up on her cheeks and she looked away as fast as possible. Something about Beau made it difficult to hold a stare, or to concentrate on anything other than how good blue looked on her. How cute she was while fiddling with her pen. How incredibly attractive her voice was, especially while explaining something. 

Yasha briefly looks back at Beau. Beau was still watching her, their eyes meet again. She was so beautiful. How was anyone supposed to concentrate on math with her being in the same room? Beau gave Yasha a small smile, before she looked back down at her notes. Yasha’s heart started beating faster. But no, Yasha would not let her mind wander, this was dangerous territory. She could remember all too well the drunken night after hearing about Beau and Reani. She could still feel the emotional turmoil it had send her through. She briefly managed to convince herself that it would be for the best. Without constantly evaluating every little move while being around Beau she would finally have the energy to focus on uni. But then somehow she ended up in this study group of which Beau was a part of and it went all downhill from there. How is one supposed to calculate the square root of x if every thought of the day is just focussed around the most amazing girl on campus and her beautiful brain mastering math with ease?

The hour went by much faster than Yasha wanted it too. Not that the study group was any help concerning her Math issues. She could have been following a quantum physics class instead of the applied math class she did and wouldn’t have noticed the difference. But this hour every Wednesday was the only time that she could talk to Beau even if it was about Math of all things. But just like the past three weeks, point 3pm Jester jumped out of her seat to head to her next class. And just like the last weeks Yasha hang back. Beau was the one with the key to their study room and Yasha couldn’t pass up the chance to talk to her, even if all they said was ‘goodbye’ and ‘see you next week’. 

And so she waited, longer than usually, while Beau packed up her countless number of notebooks.

“I think you forgot this.” Beau was holding one of Yasha’s pens in her hand.

“Thank, thank you Beau.” Yasha searched her eyes, and regretted her mistake immediately. Beau was looking at her and she seemed annoyed maybe? Or nervous? Yasha couldn’t decide.

“Do you wanna come to this party tonight? It’s at my friends place, Keg, you might know her, she and I used to ahh, be friends, ahh, a couple of times during our first semester? She is roommates with Reani who we hang out with a lot last semester, I think you guys meet?” Yasha looked at Beau, she was pretty sure Beau had never seen her looking this surprised. Beau let out a small chuckle, she seemed nervous. Yasha could feel her heart picking up a bit. Beau seemed nervous about asking her out, or joining a party at least. With Reani, and with Keg, two people Beau apparently had slept with. 

“That must be weird hanging out with both of them at the same time?” Yasha regretted the words leaving her mouth as soon as she stopped talking and her brain managed to catch up. 

“Wha - “ 

“No, no, ahh, no I just, yeah let’s, I will join you of course.” Yasha could feel her cheeks getting warm of embarrassment. And of course Beau was smarter than to let herself be distracted by Yasha’s ill intend of a cover up. Beau was the smartest person Yasha knew. She must have picked up on Yasha’s insinuation. 

But she either didn’t or didn’t care enough to show it. Instead she just smiled, the widest Yasha had ever seen her smile. “Okay, yeah let’s go there together. Is 9 fine? I can pick you up, they live pretty close to your place.” 

“Oh yeah, yeah let’s meet at 9.” 

“Awesome!” Beau’s smile, if possible, got even wider, “Well I have to go to my shift here at the library but see you tonight, yeah.” 

“Yes.” A whisper. Yasha couldn’t believe what just happened to her. Mechanically she picked up her bag and left the room. 

“Your pen.” Beau ran after her. “See you later!” With that Beau locked the door and headed downstairs to take over the checkout desk. 

Had it been hope on her face? Excitement? How was that possible? Yasha was going to accompany Beau to the party of her ex-hookup which would be attended by her ex-girlfriend. This wasn’t a place you would take your romantic interest too, this was a place for a supportive friend.

She looked back at the door of their study room. Friends, Beau made it clear. She could feel all of her emotions bubble up, tears formed in her eyes. How was she supposed to survive tonight? Even worse, why was she crying over a girl she had only had a couple of deep and meaningful conversations with? A person she should be grateful for even being her friend. 

As she was slowly walking home her thoughts became less and less cohesive. Instead they were replaced by an all too familiar feeling. Her heart slowly started to beat faster. Once she reached her front door her mind was bulging with negativity. Why she didn’t know. Nothing was wrong really. She could feel the her throat swell up and knew the tears would follow. Breathing became harder. Her brain slowly went into a negative spiral, one she was unable to stop. She didn’t know how to define her feelings, there was no reason for them nor a way to overcome them. A familiar pushing of fear was filling her up. So familiar it was almost comfortable. She was used to it, made her feel normal almost. A cold shiver shoot through her body. Yasha carefully closed the door and grabbed her blanked. Closing her eyes she sank on her bed, letting the fear fill her up, overtake her, just for a moment until it was over. It always was, eventually. 

Yasha didn’t know how much time went by but her heartbeat slowed down once again. The feeling of crying was still there, it wouldn’t leave as fast. But it would eventually until the next time this little part of her brain started taking over again. 

The doorbell rang. Yasha waited for a moment, in hopes of her roommate being back already to open the door but nothing happened. 

So she slowly got up. Her back ached a little, she must have laid the wrong way. On the way to the front door Yasha saw her face in the mirror. It looked horrible, even whiter then normally. She didn’t remember crying but her eyes looked red and puffy regardless. Without really thinking about it she opened the front door. And wished she didn’t as soon as it was opened. 

Beau was standing there, in front of her, wearing a tight black pair of pants and a fancy dress up shirt that purposefully showed more skin than it had too. Yasha’s heart started beating faster again, for a different reason this time. Beau looked amazing. And Yasha didn’t. She must have forgotten the time. Or was Beau early? She didn’t know but it didn’t matter either. Beau had seen her in a way nobody ever had, not even Molly. She usually managed to hide these outbursts, didn’t want anyone to see her like this, especially not Beau.

Beau looked unsurprisingly shocked at the view of Yasha “Yash, are you okay?” Beau reached out with her hand as if she wanted to stroke Yasha’s face but stopped halfway in between, her hand lingering in the air before slowly letting it fall back down. And then Yasha did notice that she was crying. Her body started shaking. She barely felt Beau pull her into a hug but suddenly there were arms around her holding her. 

Yasha did not notice at what point she stopped crying or how they ended up on her couch but slowly the hugging turned softer. Suddenly it wasn’t just a comforting gesture anymore and Yasha became very aware of who she was hugging. She slowly moved away so she could look at her shorter friend. Beau was frowning, a look Yasha had seen countless times on her. Whenever she was worried about one of their friends it appeared. Seeing Beau with this familiar look of concern on her beautiful face shook something loose in Yasha. All the sudden she couldn’t keep it to herself anymore.

“I don’t know why it happened today, nothing was wrong. But sometimes this sort of helpless feeling rushes through me. I am sorry, I wish you would have not have to witness this.” After a short consideration Yasha hesitantly continued: “but I am glad you were here to hold me.” 

Beau smiled. It wasn’t one of her beautiful smiles that made every room feel warmer. Instead she seemed a little unsure and maybe also sad? Suddenly Yasha felt guilty and embarrassed. She had to look away. Beau had a big evening planned. She was going to see Keg, or Reani or whoever else was going to show up at that party and motivated her to dress up the way she did and here she was, comforting her friend who couldn’t stop crying. A blush creeped up on her cheeks and Yasha slowly moved away from this amazingly perfect woman who was, by all means, very much out of her league. Beau deserved so much more than to sit here on a Friday evening with the crying mess Yasha currently was.   
“I think I will pass on tonights party, I am sorry. And I hope you won’t be late because of me. Have fun though!” The last words were meant to sound convincing and maybe cheerful but instead it just sounded very tired and sad. As soon as Beau would leave she would go back to her bed and curl up beneath her blanket to never leave it again. And the day had started so promising. What had happened between lunch and now?  
“We could watch a movie instead, if you feel up to it off course. Or just cuddle some more!” Beau managed to hit the convincing and cheerful tone perfectly. 

“You want to stay here?” Yasha looked up. And blue eyes meet hers. Beau didn’t look mad or annoyed or like she wanted to be anywhere but here. Instead she looked concerned and hopeful. Yasha’s heart started beating faster. What was going on? Her head still hurt but suddenly her bed felt a lot less comfortable compared to her couch, with Beau, and a warm blanket maybe…

“I am not going to leave you here like this.” Beau gestured in the space between them. There wasn’t much room though, Yasha noticed. They were still sitting very, very close to one another. She could almost feel Beau’s heartbeat from here.

“But the party, and Reani, and…” suddenly Yasha felt very tired, crying was exhausting, “I, … I won’t be much fun tonight. You should go, enjoy yourself. Really, I will be fine, this was just a one time thing.” It wasn’t. No matter how often Yasha kept telling herself. But it was fine, she would handle it, no need to bother Beau with it. 

“I would like to stay, if you don’t mind off course.” Beau seemed unsure of herself, in a way Yasha had never really seen her before. “I was only going to go to the party to have a good reason to ask you out. I … we can just put on a stupid movie and go back to cuddling for all I care.” Beau stopped abruptly, as if what she just said had caught her by surprise. She inhaled sharply and Yasha’s heart stopped beating, for what felt like forever. Silence filled the space between them with neither one wanting to break the electrical tension that started rising. Yasha could feel the different emotions competing to be the first ones defeating the emptiness within herself. Beau started excessively rubbing her neck. Was she feeling the same? Was this real? Was the most amazing woman Yasha knew really sitting across from her, admitting to wanting to go on a date with her? Of all the people she could be with Beau decided to stay here, with her? 

“I… what?” Yasha could feel her hands starting to sweat. She desperately wanted something to hold right now, something to centre her. “You were…, I mean you wanted to go on…, this was supposed to be a date?” 

Beau’s frown deepened. She let her hands drop into her lab and her shoulders feel down. “Oh.” Her voice was so much softer than Yasha had ever heard it. “I didn’t know you didn’t… I am sorry for assuming. I don’t, I don’t have to stay. I am sorry for intruding.” 

This time it was Yasha who initiated the hug. She pulled Beau in, disregarding any societal conventions that might exist in such a situation. Because in this moment nothing mattered but Beau and herself, how good it felt to hug her this way and how unacceptable it was that Yasha could make Beau feel any negative emotions. Beau returned the hug, pulling Yasha even tighter than before. Yasha could feel every breath Beau took, every light stroke on her back, every heartbeat, every small movement of their bodies. 

She wouldn’t have been able to accurately recall how long the two of them were sitting like this but Yasha slowly started feeling better again. The numbness that had taken over her body finally made room for different emotions. And then suddenly, all her brain could think about was Beau in her arms, after admitting too, well that. 

“I like you Beau.” Yasha’s voice made Beau shrug and Yasha couldn’t suppress a little chuckle. 

“Yeah, I like you too, a lot.” 

Butterflies filled her stomach once more. Beau liked her. They would go on a date another time, on one where Yasha would actually be aware of what was happening. And maybe after that they would kiss or hold hands. Yasha would be allowed to stare at Beau as much as she would want to. Her chest felt like it might explode. Suddenly, nothing felt impossible.

“I am sorry you had to see me like this. I don’t, I don’t really share it. But just so you know, I am on a waiting list for…, I will get help. But thank you, for being here. Ahm, do you…, are you still…, maybe we could go on a date tomorrow?”

She could feel Beaus nod against her chest.


End file.
